138 DUFFIELD CASTLE. 



hundred yards further west than it had hitherto run, which was 

 necessitated by the making of the North Midland line from Derby 

 to Leeds.* The declivity then formed was planted with trees. 

 The partly artificial circular mound, on which the Castle stood, is, 

 in its present condition, from 10 to 12 feet above the level of the 

 western part of the field. 



III. — Celtic Occupation of the Site. 



The explorations, recently conducted on the castle hill at 

 Duffield, have yielded small but sufficient proof that this site was 

 originally occupied by some Celtic settlement. Here they had 

 one of their communistic camps, and near by they interred their 

 dead. Further trench-cutting would, in all probability, bring, more 

 of interest pertaining to this period to light. A few small pieces 

 of cinerary urns or other pottery have been found in different parts, 

 of the peculiar and almost unmistakeable hue and texture of this 

 date, and the fragment with the dotted and thumb-nail patterns 

 (fig. 1) here drawn, was found by us in 

 the trench marked G on the plan ; the 

 other pieces found there were Romano- 

 British, but this seems to us to be Celtic 

 in design. It is represented half the 

 size of the original. If this is the case, the 

 Romans when making their camp pro- 

 bably disturbed a Celtic interment, for 

 we believe the shallow foss to be un- 

 mistakably their (Roman) work. Fig. 1. 



Six stone implements, often known by the generic term of 

 " celts," have been found on the site. Three of these are drawn 

 on Plate IX., at a scale of half the original size. 



Number one has an axe head shape, but it is of light weight, 

 and of nearly natural formation. However, it has been 

 sufficiently shaped and improved artificially to come under the 

 category of stone implements, for whatever purpose it may have 

 served. Its size is four inches long, and tapers nearly to a point 



* See Williams' The Midland Railway ; Its Rise and Progress, 1877. 



